At the age of 82, he invented a machine to create drinking water “out of thin air”.

According to data from the World Health Organization (WHO) worldwide there are 785 million people without access to drinking water. As a solution, a Spanish company designed Aquaer generators, a system of extract this vital fluid from the air and thus supply the arid regions where there is a shortage of this natural element.

The inventor of this device is Enrique Veiga, an engineer of 82 years old and is based in air conditioners and the effect of condensation.

The system uses electricity to cool the air, condense it, and turn it into water. A small machine produces between 50 and 75 liters per day and the larger versions even produce up to 5,000 liters per day.

There are other water generators in the world that use similar technology, but the difference between these machines and those from Veiga is that the former require that there be high humidity and low temperatures in the environment.

However, the Spanish invention works at temperatures up to 40 degrees and it can withstand humidity between 10% and 15%.

In 2017, Nhat Vuong, a Vietnamese refugee, founded the association under the name Creation of water continue to develop Veiga’s invention and bring it to those who need it most.

To do this, Vuong bought one of the machines and took it to a refugee camp in the Lebanese city of Tripoli.

These devices are already operational in several African countries. “In the Namibian villages that we visited, people were amazed, they did not understand and asked where the water was coming from,” said Veiga.

Likewise, Nhat Voung argued that the next step is to raise funds for provide solar energy panels in order to minimize dependence on electricity supply and take care of the environmental aspect of the project.

Large scale

Using a similar concept, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) plans to install “water generators” that convert humidity in the air into potable water for public consumption.

The innovative project is led by the American company AQUOVUM, in collaboration with the University of Science and Technology of Khalifa. It will be tested in Masdar, a sustainable city under construction next to Abu Dhabi Airport.

The “hyper-dehumidifier” is powered by solar energy and it provides an abundant and uninterrupted supply of water from the humid air of the United Arab Emirates.

The town of Masdar has around 87,777 solar panels, which will help fuel big fans of this new technology.

Pipes filled with this air circulate with liquid refrigerant to cool the air until it reaches the dew point, when water vapor condenses into liquid water. The water is then collected and purified for consumption.

A modified transport box will be the world’s first carbon neutral water generator when installed in a futuristic eco-city.

A bank of 20 dehumidifiers can produce 6,700 liters of fresh water per day when local conditions are 26 ° C and 60% humidity.

With information from La Vanguardia.

SL